How do you send a bookmobile around to places where there are no roads? In the 1930s, eastern Kentucky was full of tiny towns, coal camps, and isolated homesteads, but very few drivable roads to connect them. There were also few libraries, and they had few books. The Great Depression only made conditions worse. To fight illiteracy and help the small rural schools, the WPA launched a New Deal program called the Pack Horse Library Initiative, to deliver books to the most inaccessible Appalachian hollows by librarians or other "book women" riding horses or mules. (via Nag on the Lake)
One of FDR's great ideas.
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